


Opus Dei

by Renata Lord (snowlight)



Category: World of Warcraft
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-26
Updated: 2012-01-26
Packaged: 2017-10-30 04:24:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 376
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/327690
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/snowlight/pseuds/Renata%20Lord
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Backstory for Salandria (a la The Burning Crusade), of the Children's Week fame.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Opus Dei

The Lower City orphans usually travelled in packs. Despite Matron Mercy's best efforts, children from different races never quite mingled completely. The little trolls and orclets had their own natural alliance, while the dwarves and gnomes— _shorties_ , as they were known to the older horde children—looked to loud human kids for a core structure. Draenei and blood elf children mostly kept to themselves, fundamentally foreign to either side.

Salandria was an exception to this rule of thumb. Dressed in a dark red skirt that always seemed to twirl, she moved easily between the different little groups like a crimson butterfly. Even the orc girls, fiercely suspicious of anyone wrapped in girly frill, grudgingly admitted that they did like her hair. She had a translucent charm that was uncommon even amongst the blood elves, and for that those around her forgave her caprice and occasional outbursts of drama.

It was hard not to forgive her. Everything about the child was preternaturally cheerful if not _entirely_ innocent to a more seasoned eye. The grown-ups of Lower City were hardened and reticent, but the orphanage children were undeniably fond of little Salandria. When she said she would marry a prince when she grows up, they did not laugh at her. When she looked up to Shattrath's crowded sky and said she would ride on "pretty" dragons one day, they didn't really doubt her either.

Even her fellow blood elves, however, voiced wide-eyed skepticism when she announced that she was going to become a blood knight. Her shoulders were thin and narrow, her limbs as soft as a newly sprung willow branch. How could a girl like that ever become a knight, clad in shining armor and breaking the hollow bones of enemies on fields of battle? It was worse than pretending to be a lost princess waiting to be miraculously found— half of the girls in the orphanage had tried _that one_ at some point, at least.

Salandria responded in the same way she always did when she didn't like what she heard—she wrinkled her nose and lifted her jaw, giving off a playful but stubborn grin. It was a look that said: you are wrong; but that's all right, you will see in time, _I know_.


End file.
